M15x has trouble displaying some web pages?

[LinkRS]

Hi Everyone,

I am not sure if this is a problem, or due to the "slow" processor in my M15x, but several webpages (such as http://nintendods.com/) render very slowly on my laptop. I have tried updating the graphics driver, but there is no change. I have set the power scheme to "Max Performance", and it too doesn't make a difference. Is this typical behaviour, or a symptom of the low clock speed of the Core i7 Q720? My specs are:

Alienware M15x (Built Dec 2009)
Core i7 Q720 (1.6 GHz)
4 GB DDR3 PC1333 RAM
500 GB HDD (7200 RPM)
Slot load Blu-Ray ROM
GeForce GTX 260M 1 GB
Windows 7 Ultimate Edition
Using Internet Explorer 8

It doesn't seem like showing website should cause a problem. And some ages are fine, while others visually struggle as the above site does. Thanks in advance!

Rich S.

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for the responses. Instead of replying to each one, I thought I would summarize the additional information in one reply.

My Internet connection speed should be fine, as I have "Fiber-Optic fast" Qwest DSL reated at 12Mbps (speed tests show ~10Mbps).

The problem I am seeing, is slow page animations, not slow loading. The page loads fine, but some pages (as in the original page I mentioned), the flash animations are slow, and exhibit extreme shearing, as if it was taxing the computer/video card to display them. Other pages with flash (like YouTube) have no problems. This site http://pocketnow.com/, shows hesitations and sluggish scrolling. It seems to be hit or miss, some sites are fine, and others are just slow. I have considered trying an alternate browser, but am not a fan of Mozilla or Google. Apple tends to produce bloatware to help aid their point about PCs being bad, but I was thinking about maybe Opera.

Another page that is just plain sluggish and slow is http://wmpoweruser.com/. It seems that the more embedded flash, the slower the page is. This is why I am thinking that the Core i7 Q720 just doesn't have a high enough raw clock speed (same clock as my HP Mini, 1.6 GHz) Or perhaps it is the GeForce GTX 260M? Perhaps PowerMizer clocks it down at the desktop, and makes it too slow? Not sure, so I thought I would post here and see if this behaviour is "normal" for the M15x.

I don't have any malware or virii infestations, as I am pretty sensitve to the tasks running on my computer at any given time, and check frequently for such things.

Thanks for your help so far, and thanks in advance for any additional help

Rich S.

[inap]

does it happen when using firefox or google? i haven't used ie in ages.

[silvercup]

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for the responses. Instead of replying to each one, I thought I would summarize the additional information in one reply.

My Internet connection speed should be fine, as I have "Fiber-Optic fast" Qwest DSL reated at 12Mbps (speed tests show ~10Mbps).

The problem I am seeing, is slow page animations, not slow loading. The page loads fine, but some pages (as in the original page I mentioned), the flash animations are slow, and exhibit extreme shearing, as if it was taxing the computer/video card to display them. Other pages with flash (like YouTube) have no problems. This site http://pocketnow.com/, shows hesitations and sluggish scrolling. It seems to be hit or miss, some sites are fine, and others are just slow. I have considered trying an alternate browser, but am not a fan of Mozilla or Google. Apple tends to produce bloatware to help aid their point about PCs being bad, but I was thinking about maybe Opera.

Another page that is just plain sluggish and slow is http://wmpoweruser.com/. It seems that the more embedded flash, the slower the page is. This is why I am thinking that the Core i7 Q720 just doesn't have a high enough raw clock speed (same clock as my HP Mini, 1.6 GHz) Or perhaps it is the GeForce GTX 260M? Perhaps PowerMizer clocks it down at the desktop, and makes it too slow? Not sure, so I thought I would post here and see if this behaviour is "normal" for the M15x.

I don't have any malware or virii infestations, as I am pretty sensitve to the tasks running on my computer at any given time, and check frequently for such things.

Thanks for your help so far, and thanks in advance for any additional help

Rich S.

Again these sites work fine for me with the same specs as yours. Unless your hardware is faulty then it is not a hardware issue. The 720QM is not slow for anything, let alone web browsing and the GTX 260m can breeze through almost anything. If your games are running fine then I doubt your hardware is faulty which means it has to be something with either your connection or your browser (the latter seems the more likely). Firefox is the best, you may not like Mozilla (I used to be an IE junkie and would not touch Firefox for a long time, but now that I have I will never go back to IE) but I would recommend that in this case you swallow your prejudice against Mozilla and try it because it is the best and I would be surprised if it didn't resolve your problem.

EDIT: I tried the sites you mentioned with IE myself and whilst they ran smoothly, it was slightly slower than when I had them open in Firefox. Further evidence of this being a browser issue.

[LinkRS]

Again these sites work fine for me with the same specs as yours. Unless your hardware is faulty then it is not a hardware issue. The 720QM is not slow for anything, let alone web browsing and the GTX 260m can breeze through almost anything. If your games are running fine then I doubt your hardware is faulty which means it has to be something with either your connection or your browser (the latter seems the more likely). Firefox is the best, you may not like Mozilla (I used to be an IE junkie and would not touch Firefox for a long time, but now that I have I will never go back to IE) but I would recommend that in this case you swallow your prejudice against Mozilla and try it because it is the best and I would be surprised if it didn't resolve your problem.

EDIT: I tried the sites you mentioned with IE myself and whilst they ran smoothly, it was slightly slower than when I had them open in Firefox. Further evidence of this being a browser issue.

Hi silvercup,

I have had to suffer through Mozilla hell at work for the past 8 years, and have no desire to bring that headache home I am also extremely paranoid about Google. I use the search engine, but leave it at that. However, this evening I did download and install Opera 10.50.

Running this browser, I noticed two things: 1 Opera did not really load aster than IE, but it seemed faster, as it did not display anything until the entire site was loaded, and then it popped in. In IE, I can often see site elements render as they are downloaded. 2 The default install of IE from Alienware has set zoom to 125%

When viewing the same page in both Opera and IE, it was noticably faster scrolling on all of the test pages I mentioned earlier. On the Nintendo page, the flash slide-show was very smooth, and did not exhibit the screen tearing or sluggishness I see in IE. However, when I set the zoom in Opera to 120% (closest I could get to 125% default in IE), all of the pages except 1 were just as smooth as before. The flash slideshow was a little slower, but not anywhere near as bad is IE. www.pocketnow.com was just as slow scrolling as IE. Soooo, the issue seems to be related to page zooming. Because, after noticing this, setting IE back to 100%, the suspect pages sped up considerably. It looks like the problem is IE, at least when zoomed in. It is too bad that I must have IE to accesss some of my companies internal websites from home, because otherwise I might stick with Opera, or perhaps give Safari a try....

Thanks!

Rich S.

[silvercup]

Hi silvercup,

I have had to suffer through Mozilla hell at work for the past 8 years, and have no desire to bring that headache home I am also extremely paranoid about Google. I use the search engine, but leave it at that. However, this evening I did download and install Opera 10.50.

Running this browser, I noticed two things: 1 Opera did not really load aster than IE, but it seemed faster, as it did not display anything until the entire site was loaded, and then it popped in. In IE, I can often see site elements render as they are downloaded. 2 The default install of IE from Alienware has set zoom to 125%

When viewing the same page in both Opera and IE, it was noticably faster scrolling on all of the test pages I mentioned earlier. On the Nintendo page, the flash slide-show was very smooth, and did not exhibit the screen tearing or sluggishness I see in IE. However, when I set the zoom in Opera to 120% (closest I could get to 125% default in IE), all of the pages except 1 were just as smooth as before. The flash slideshow was a little slower, but not anywhere near as bad is IE. www.pocketnow.com was just as slow scrolling as IE. Soooo, the issue seems to be related to page zooming. Because, after noticing this, setting IE back to 100%, the suspect pages sped up considerably. It looks like the problem is IE, at least when zoomed in. It is too bad that I must have IE to accesss some of my companies internal websites from home, because otherwise I might stick with Opera, or perhaps give Safari a try....

Thanks!

Rich S.

Glad you got it sorted out